Glen Farley has covered the Patriots for The Enterprise since the Raymond Berry regime.

Patriots announce signings of Cole, Koutouvides

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By Glen Farley

Glen Farley has covered sports for The Enterprise since 1978. His time on the Patriots beat dates back to the final year of the Raymond Berry regime, 1989. You could say his roots lie in Foxboro. He once won an award for a piece he wrote on the sod
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Glen Farley has covered sports for The Enterprise since 1978. His time on the Patriots beat dates back to the final year of the Raymond Berry regime, 1989. You could say his roots lie in Foxboro. He once won an award for a piece he wrote on the sod at Gillette Stadium.

March 20, 2013

FOXBOROUGH, Mass. – The New England Patriots announced that they have re-signed unrestricted free agents CB Marquice Cole and LB Niko Koutouvides. Terms of the contracts were not announced.

Cole, 29, is a veteran of four NFL seasons with the New York Jets (2009-11) and the Patriots (2012). The 5-10, 192-pounder joined New England as a free agent on March 19, 2012. He played in 14 games with one start last season and finished with 12 total tackles, one interception, three passes defensed and seven special teams tackles. He played in both postseason games and added four defensive tackles and four special teams tackles.

Cole originally entered the NFL as a rookie free agent with Oakland out of Northwestern in 2007. He spent the end of the 2007 season on the Tennessee practice squad and part of the 2008 season on the practice squad of New Orleans. Cole began the 2009 season on the practice squad of the New York Jets before joining the 53-man roster early in September. Cole has played in 51 NFL games with two starts and has registered 26 defensive tackles, three interceptions with one returned for a touchdown and 43 special teams tackles.

Koutouvides, 31, went to training camp with New England last summer but was released on Aug. 31 before being re-signed on Sept. 19. He played in each of the final 14 games of the Patriots’ 2012 season and both postseason games. The 6-foot-2, 228-pounder registered eight special teams tackles and one tackle on defense in the regular season and one special teams tackle in the postseason. Koutouvides originally signed with New England on Aug. 14, 2011, but was released when the team trimmed the roster to 53 prior to the start of the season. He returned to the team at midseason and played in 11 games and all three postseason games.

Koutouvides was originally drafted by the Seattle Seahawks in the fourth round (116th overall) of the 2004 NFL Draft out of Purdue. He played four seasons with the Seahawks before signing with the Denver Broncos as an unrestricted free agent on March 3, 2008. He was released by the Broncos after the 2008 season and signed by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers a few weeks later, where he spent the next two seasons.

In nine NFL seasons, Koutouvides has played in 125 games with three starts and has 63 total tackles and 118 special teams tackles.